Jurors Award $2.4 Million To Man Hit By Car

August 2, 1987|By Sean Holton of The Sentinel Staff

An Orange County jury has handed one of the largest personal-injury awards in county history to a man who suffered permanent brain damage when a car hit him as he jaywalked across a Winter Park street in 1984.

The six-member jury announced its $2.4-million verdict at 11 p.m. Friday after deliberating nine hours on the lawsuit brought by Joseph Mudrey, 33, against Larry H. Brown, the driver of the car.

Mudrey, now living in Schenectady, N.Y., suffered severe memory loss and has been confined to a wheelchair since the accident. He learned of the verdict when his mother awakened him at 5:30 a.m. Saturday in the Orlando hotel where the family stayed during the one-week trial.

''When I woke him up, he looked at me and he said, 'Did we win?' '' said Mary Louise Sisto, Mudrey's 60-year-old mother. ''He just looked at me and there was a smile. I told him we would be able to get a van for him now and that seemed to please him.''

Robert Buonauro and James Powers, the Orlando attorneys who argued Mudrey's case, were elated.

''This jury was super,'' said Powers. ''This is what makes this system great. Those people worked very, very hard.''

Mudrey was struck April 17, 1984, at about 11 p.m. as he crossed a six- lane stretch of Lee Road just west of U.S. Highway 17-92. Brown was traveling west on Lee Road and was looking over his shoulder to change lanes when his car hit Mudrey. His head slammed into the windshield.

Mudrey was not in a crosswalk. Testimony showed that Mudrey had been drinking, but jurors discounted that as a factor in their decision.

Buonauro said tests taken about two hours after the accident showed Mudrey's blood-alcohol content at 0.07 percent, below the 0.10-percent legal intoxication limit for Florida drivers. Brown's tests, taken one hour after the accident, showed a blood-alcohol content of 0.01 percent, Buonauro said.

Brown was not issued any traffic citations after the accident, Buonauro said.

Mudrey filed suit in 1986 against him and Key Capital Corp., the leasing company that owned the car he was driving. Neva Kelaher, an attorney for the company, declined comment.

Neither Brown, a college professor who now lives in Johnson City, Tenn., nor his attorney could be reached for comment Saturday. The defendant's insurers, State Farm Insurance Co. and Wausau Insurance Co., also could not be reached.

The sum awarded Mudrey would have been even larger had the six-member jury not decided he shared half the blame for the accident. The jury assessed damages to Mudrey at $4.8 million.

But under Florida law, the amount of an award is reduced by the percentage of blame the jury believes the victim shared for the accident. Mudrey was found 50 percent responsible for his injuries, so his award is half the amount of his damages.

''What we were saying was that one party was not any more negligent than the other party,'' said jury foreman J.R. Bolton. ''Mudrey entered a six-lane traffic area and crossed the street. . . . He was jaywalking.''

Bolton, 52, said some jurors thought Mudrey was ''95 percent'' to blame, while others thought Brown was 95 percent to blame. The 50-percent figure was a compromise, he said.

The jury foreman said the evidence showed that Brown began changing lanes while he was still looking over his shoulder.

''We feel that the man Brown was negligent because he wasn't aware of what was in front of him,'' Bolton said. ''He seemed to be more aware of what was behind him.''

Mudrey's mother said he moved to Orlando in January of 1983 to pursue a career as a cook. He was comatose for two months after the accident and was later admitted to a head-injury treatment center in Connecticut. She said her son has lost coordination and has no memory of the 15 months he lived in Florida.

The award will help pay Mudrey's medical bills and the expenses of a live-in therapist at the family home.

If it is not overturned by Judge Frederick Pfeiffer, the award to Mudrey will match a $2.4-million jury verdict against Orlando Regional Medical Center last July in a malpractice case involving a severely brain-damaged child.

In February 1986, another Orange County jury awarded $2.15 million to a patient of Orlando psychiatrist Chawaullur Chacko who claimed her doctor neglected her before she tried to kill herself. But that verdict later was overturned by a judge.

''The fact remains that Mr. Mudrey is permanently damaged for the rest of his life,'' Bolton said. ''And the jury felt like we should at least make sure that Mr. Mudrey be taken care of for the rest of his life.''